Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, the student financial assistance program is designed for all individuals from all walks of life, et cetera. It has specifications to it that it must be recognized programs and, as I mentioned earlier, we do have federal funding that applies in this particular case. The Member referenced the fact that possibly we should discuss this with the federal government, which we are more than willing to do. Additionally, we have developed an alternate program for help. In this case, Mr. Chair, that's the assistance we provide through the funding that we have in the literacy program, which his base funded, by the way. I have a Ministerial council, Mr. Chair, that can certainly have a look at this as well, and I am sure they may have looked at this previously. They do annual reports for me. We do an annual report on the literacy funding and that is where this particular $100,000 in funding is allocated. Yes, it is used for other purposes, but we can ensure that we address the issue of demand on this and we can certainly look at the possibility of alternatives to the program. We are, as I mentioned earlier, looking at the employability of persons with disabilities with the federal government. That may give us opportunities and provide us with a financial base to introduce various alternate programs, Mr. Chair. I will leave my response at that, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. Ms. Lee.

I think I have made my point. I still am concerned about the Minister not acknowledging that he needs to respect the decision of the Student Financial Assistance Appeal Board and he could do it if he wants to do it. He could do it by mobilizing the department and getting the support of the Cabinet and getting the support of this House. Dealing with the Government of Canada is one thing, but we are a House that passes laws, we set up regulations all the time, we create funds for all sorts of reasons and to meet all social needs. It's totally within his power to state that he respects the decision of the Student Financial Assistance Appeal Board in this regard and to set up the policy to follow that decision, rather than having his department keep repeating that somehow this board did not do the right thing. I am going to leave it there and follow up with the Minister, but I am looking for his commitment to look at financial implications of taking action on this.

Thank you. Minister Ootes.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the Member's comments. We are concerned about decisions that are made by various appeal boards and so forth. As an alternative to the program, we established this particular program to assist individuals with disabilities and that was $100,000. As I say, we are also working on alternatives to that, so it's not as though we are ignoring the issue, Mr. Chair. We are definitely paying attention to it and we are prepared to continue to look at it and continue to do it. We must respect the rules and regulations that may be in place for ourselves with regard to the student financial assistance program. Thank you.

Thank you. General comments. Mr. Delorey.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I haven't spoken yet on general comments with the Minister of Education, but I feel that I have to make a few comments on his opening remarks. I know that the Minister has stated quite clearly that people are the NWT's most valuable resource and that the department realized early in its mandate, and so did this government, the need to invest in our young citizens. I take it that that is all geared to doing the very best we can for our young people and getting them the very best education that they can get and also I could imply by that, that the people we are talking about that are most valuable are also the people who look after the education of our young people, not only in the teaching end of it, but also in the different boards that we have. I think that that's great. Those are very good statements and one can't argue with those.

I am totally amazed, Mr. Chair, that when an issue that's trying to be addressed by the department and there is no will from the department to do anything about it, the number of excuses and the reasons that they can come up with for not doing anything. Yet, when something comes up in front of us here that nobody can make any sense of, at least from outside of the House, anyway, we have received a mountain of paper and a ton of excuses as to why we have to do it. It's certainly not a money issue here now that is preventing us from going ahead with any projects in Fort Smith that we want to do and for projects that hadn't appeared on the books as being urgent, to suddenly come before us with the number of reasons that we are getting that are still very questionable as to why we have to proceed with these issues.

The issue of the board in Hay River; the DEA in Hay River is not a new issue with the department. I am sure he will agree with me on that. I feel that I am not prepared to let that issue go away in promoting our young people and the education of our young people and what is best. What can we do to best educate our young people? I think we have mentioned many, many times that communities that know their people have the most say or should have the most say in what is best for their students. I look at issues like when we talk about young teachers, our teachers, graduating teachers, who are ready to go into the workforce and want to come back North and work. I know the department has done a lot of work towards bringing some of our teachers back. I am not saying that there can't be mistakes made in the department, Mr. Chair. That happens all the time, but when we hear about one that has been missed or when a mistake has been made and it's brought to the department, it's very frustrating to try to get anything done that really, really resembles what the department is preaching about with maximizing our northern employment and getting our students...I would like the Minister to comment on how his department approaches an issue where a northern student has gone through the training, is ready to join the workforce in the North and is being overlooked and is going through hoops and every roadblock in place to stop them from coming back. What is the department's action plan to deal with those particular cases? Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I need more clarification here. I am not sure what the Member is speaking about. If he has a specific case where an individual has had difficulty obtaining employment, I am not sure I am aware of what the Member is speaking about.

Mr. Delorey, maybe just ask the last question again.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I certainly don't want to bring up any particular case here. I could probably bring up about three that I have heard of, and I am sure there are more in the Territories. I am simply asking if one of our northern students graduated in teaching and it's brought to the attention of the department that they've been jumping through all kinds of hoops and all kinds of roadblocks about why they can't obtain employment in the North, what is the department's approach to dealing with a situation like that?

Thank you. Minister Ootes.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We are concerned about those kinds of situations and I personally intervene to ensure that our policies are adhered to -- I did that last year -- to ensure that students...We do have a situation where we want to hire our own students who graduate from the teacher education program, for example, in our schools. We start at the maximizing northern employment program. It is an excellent program, one that is working, to all intents and purposes, very, very well. We are finding that people are coming back to the Territories to work. There are cases where individuals have had difficulty finding work in some cases. They couldn't get the job in the specific community that they wished. One of the concerns we have is that we can't guarantee employment to individuals in their specific choice of community, but there are also some people who have perhaps fallen through the cracks and not been employed, and that is of concern to me. I am very concerned that our teachers who graduate are not being employed. However, they must be aware of the fact that they can't be guaranteed employment in a specific community. Sometimes that's just not available. If I know that we have graduates who are not being employed, then we can certainly follow through with that to see what we can do on our part, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. Mr. Delorey.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We talk a lot about what the department has done, and the pupil/teacher ratios, and I agree that that's been a very important area and the department has done an awful lot and put a lot of money into that area. Obviously, some schools have benefited a lot more from this program for reducing pupil/teacher ratios. The smaller schools have probably benefited a lot more than the larger schools on this. I think we still have some ways to go. I look at some of the schools and the number of parents who come in on a daily basis, who help out in the schools. They do a great job and they need to be recognized. Could the Minister comment on whether he is aware of how many volunteers we have coming into our schools to help out on a daily basis, and what's being done to recognize volunteers who do come into the schools to help out?

Thank you. Minister Ootes.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yes, volunteers are extremely important to us and there is a need for us to continue promoting the use of volunteers in schools and there are many. I don't have any participation statistics on hand, Mr. Chairman, but we can see what we can find out in terms of the numbers of volunteers that take place. We have situations like job shadowing in some cases, and recognition programs are a good suggestion. We can certainly put that forward to the school boards and we will certainly be able to take that up as a discussion item with the chairs and the superintendents that we meet with on a constant basis. I am scheduled to have a meeting with the board chairs within a couple of weeks, Mr. Chair. We will take that up as an item that we can do better recognition of our volunteers. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I was hoping to address some of this stuff under detail, but with the new information provided by the Minister since our go-round yesterday, and with respect to the facilities that came into question yesterday about the residences in the NWT, I have gone through the pieces of information the Minister has provided. Knowing these are somewhat dated, June 2000, both for the Green House report and the Brown House report and looking at the summaries and looking at the e-mail that is attached to this from the assistant fire marshal, I just have a hard time justifying this, as I said yesterday. The decisions we make are only as good as the information that is provided. I thank the Minister for providing this information, but on the executive summary of the Brown House report dated June 14, 2000, the most significant of which is the practice of blocking fire doors in the open position. Now that's in the paragraph...I guess we should start off at the beginning of the sentence. "In addition to the health issues, this building also suffers from fire safety problems, the most significant of which is the practice of blocking fire doors in the open position." Then there is a lack of fire separations, inadequate protection of exits, inoperative doors and hardware and then from the Green House report of the same date, June 14, 2000, "in addition to the health issues related to mildew, this building also suffers from fire safety problems such as lack of fire separations, inadequate protection of exits and inoperative doors and hardware."

These are almost three years old, a couple more months and they will be three years old. The e-mail that we are having a chance to look at here is dated January 20, 2003, and it says that they are making a list of fire safety deficiencies that require immediate attention. Does the Minister or the staff have that list?

Thank you, Mr. Chair. If we don't have it handy here, we can certainly attempt to get it for the Member.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. That would be really appreciated. Definitely things would have changed or deteriorated to even a greater degree, the interval being almost three years. Further to that, Mr. Chairman, as I look through this information -- and this is from the department of staff housing, Aurora College, dated February 2003 -- in reference to Aurora Campus in Inuvik and it says, "The college has additional housing units currently leased to a private developer that can be made available for student housing." I believe there is an agreement with that developer as to what units are available and what he can do with those units. Is it a fact that we lease to him and then we will have to lease back from him for those facilities or row houses? What are the details there? Thank you.